South Sudan activist Peter Biar Ajak arrested in US for $4m ‘smuggling’ weapons

South Sudan’s activist Peter Biar Ajak has been arrested and charged in the US for attempting to smuggle weapons worth $4 million to his country, potentially harming his profile as an activist seeking to tame graft.

The US Department of Justice said on Tuesday Mr Ajak, 40, and his compatriot Abraham Chol Keech, 44, were facing charges of conspiring to purchase and “illegally export millions of dollars’ worth” of military-grade weapons to South Sudan. They wanted to export the arms under a false contract, the charges said.

Those weapons included automatic rifles, grenade launchers, Stinger missile systems, hand grenades, sniper rifles, ammunition, and other export-controlled items from the United States to South Sudan.

Exporting weapons of any type to South Sudan is illegal under the UN Security Council arms embargo as well as two laws in the US -- the Arms Export Control Act (AECA) and the Export Control Reform Act (ECRA).

The UN Security Council imposed the embargo to slow down a civil war that had erupted in 2016. The war ended in 2018 following a peace deal between President Salva Kiir and various armed groups. But the embargo, imposed in 2018, was only recently extended to May this year.